The Russian invasion of Ukraine has refocused investor attention on the defense industry and especially on cybersecurity companies.
Until the invasion, shares of cybersecurity company Palo Alto Networks PANW had been “correcting 2021 gains with a sideways to lower movement since late December,” Real Money’s technical analyst Bruce Kamich wrote just before Russia’s move. at the time, “With PANW I see the potential for some further near-term price gains but the risk of further declines if we get another rally failure.”
But even technical analysis has a hard time accounting for the actions of dictators and the stock gained sharply after Russian tanks rolled into Ukraine in mid-February. Shares of Palo Alto quickly rose by about 25% to an all-time high. They have since fallen back to levels where they were trading last November, but are still well off the year’s lows.
With cybersecurity in the headlines, JIm Cramer recently spoke with Nikesh Arora, chairman and CEO of Palo Alto Networks PAN, on the Mad Money show.
Arora told Cramer that Palo Alto has spent the past three-and-a-half years rebuilding its platform from scratch. The result is that it now has much better ability to detect and stop cyber attacks as they happen.
Cybersecurity is more relevant than ever, Arora added because hacker groups, companies and whole nations are all probing for any weaknesses they can exploit. Palo Alto customers have to keep their information safe, he said, and that means making cybersecurity a priority, especially as the complexity of technology grows.
Source: https://www.thestreet.com/investing/cyber-security-stocks-and-the-new-defense-industry?puc=yahoo&cm_ven=YAHOO&yptr=yahoo